Stone-Cold Lovers
by T1meslayer
Summary: An Omega Ruby/Alpha Sapphire-based story in which Brendan, acclaimed Champion of Hoenn's Ever Grande City Pokémon League, is too much of an idiot to realize that Rustboro City's Gym Leader didn't actually just want to "review lesson plans" with him over lunch. Rated 'T' for some adult language and jokes about sexual intercourse? If that's something worth warning about.


The multi-story Devon Corporation office building in Rustboro City had no bell tower. It had a sleek and modern blocky structure made from yellowed brick, a vertical shaft of windows just above the entryway to parallel the rows of thin, rectangular windows on each floor and a sizable collection of factory complexes with smoke stacks that had been dormant since the company discovered how to harness residual Infinity Energy from the Kalos Region's Ultimate Weapon.

But it had no bell tower.

Yet residents lived their lives by the hourly chimes that echoed across the industrialized city from speakers installed on the corporation's roof years ago.

It was such an ingrained part of their lives that an old schoolyard folk legend persisted across generations. Everyone knew the whispers that President Stone modeled the sounds after a bell atop the Celestial Tower in Unova — despite him having a physical replica of the bell hidden in his office from an age-old trade deal.

However, as much as students enjoyed passing around the whispers of an ephemeral, unknowable source from who knows when, they were much less happy to hear that 8:00 a.m. chime ring out.

It always starts with a tune: The first eight notes of the Rustboro theme song.

Then come the boisterous gongs that tick off the hour:

_**Bum.**_

_**Bum.**_

_**Bum.**_

_**Bum.**_

_**Bum.**_

_**Bum.**_

_**Bum.**_

_**Bum.**_

Nary a second after the final tone echoes into silence, Roxanne is tapping a pointer stick against the green chalkboard at the far end of the Trainers' School. Every student in the room had long since been conditioned to quiet down and face forward.

"Good morning class," she begins as always. Her voice was chipper; standing out on a morning with murky skies as much as her red tie and leggings stood out against the dark grey, skirted dress that exposed the short sleeves of her white dress shirt underneath.

"Happy Friday morning to you all."

"Good morning Miss Roxanne," the room echoes back.

It was a mostly hollow, empty greeting that one might expect from a group of youngsters forced to wake up so early. But most of the dissenting voices added an excited flavor to that collective drone, as nobody seemed particularly upset about the prospects of seeing the happy face of their instructor.

Roxanne sets the pointer stick down on the aluminum tray jutting out from the bottom of the chalkboard and approaches her podium, dark brown shoes clacking the entire way. She rests her hands on the angled surface and briefly looks around.

The Rustboro Trainers' School had not enrolled a large class this year, 20 students max — and that was assuming they all bothered to show up.

But the Rock-type Pokémon expert thought they were a great crop of kids. That made it all the easier for her to come in with a smile on her face.

"Today's lesson was going to be a continuation of our discussion on weather effects," she says. Her words were obviously chosen with an academic's precision, yet Roxanne had a way of making them sound warm and natural to the younger group.

"But I promised you all we would have a guest lecture after that particularly stellar performance on the Status Effect test last week, and I don't want to give you all the impression that I make empty promises."

She pauses for dramatic effect, which produces the desired effect: A gaggle of students silently whispering to one another about what the surprise lecture could be.

That energetic buzz around the room brought a smile to Roxanne's face.

"Thus I am happy to introduce an old acquaintance of mine whom you might be familiar with." She raises both hands to gesture everyone's eyes toward the door in the back of the room. "Please welcome Ever Grande City's youngest ever Champion: Brendan!"

Everyone whips their bodies back to look over their seats with gasps and squeals.

They'd find the boy already standing in the doorway, sheepishly rubbing his neck at the influx of attention.

His style, though somewhat goofy, was instantly recognizable by the young fans of Pokémon battling: Knee-length grey athletic shorts, a red bicyclist shirt with matching grey stripes that formed a shape reminiscent of the symbol for pi under his chest and a lime green backpack with a white Pokeball lock on the strap.

Oh, and let's not forget the iconic hat that made his head look like it carried a drooping mop of white hair.

Even Brendan had trouble defending that fashion choice.

A barrage of questions and reaching, grubby hands accost the young Champion. Brendan tries to sidestep them and offer vague, mumbling answers to a number of questions that blur together because they all come at once. Roxanne just stands back and giggles at the show, waiting for him to finally join her at the front of the room.

"Yes, yes. I know it's exciting, but please settle down class."

Roxanne's words are followed for the most part. It would be hard to entirely quash the badly contained whispers, however.

"Since I know most of you would like to challenge the Pokémon League after you graduate, I thought it would be good to have a true expert in the subject come and talk about how it all works." She looks toward Brendan and holds up her hand to frame him.

He responds with a half-hearted laugh while adjusting the backpack strap over his shoulder.

"I don't know that I'm much more of an expert than you Roxanne," he starts. "You've been a Gym Leader far longer than I've been a Champion."

The boy's voice was in an awkward prime: He was old enough to have a mature tone past the cracks and squeaks of puberty, but he still carried the verbal mannerisms and energy of an adventure-hungry youth.

"Regardless," she says with a dismissive wave of her hand before stepping away to give Brendan the spotlight. "Your title holds much more weight for my students, I can assure you of that."

"Right, sure." Brendan clears his throat as he looks back at the beaming faces bound to their desks.

When he shuffles his feet, the sounds of his sneakers squeaking echo around the room. The giggles that result lead him to grow self-conscious and quickly stop.

"Well you wouldn't think so, but the subject is a bit dry. So I guess I can start by answering a few questions if anyone—"

By the time he's halfway through 'questions,' every hand in the room shot up.

"… Has any," he finishes a bit meeker.

Then comes the hard part. Brendan starts to aimlessly wave a finger around the room, trying to decide whom to call on. Each person he passes over gets a little more excited, jumping up and down in his or her seat and chanting like Vigoroths.

Eventually, he points to a slight girl with thick glasses and long, blonde hair.

"How about you," he says.

"Sarah?" Roxanne adds on encouragingly from the corner of the room, where she seemed content to let Brendan drown in attention as she messed with her PokéNav.

"Who's your favorite Pokémon?!" The girl asks with a spittle-filled tone you can only get by missing your two front teeth.

"Ah, make me choose my children why don't you…" Brendan mutters, which draws some laughter. "I guess it would be wrong of me not to say Sceptile, since we've been together the longest. But I probably rely on my Gardevoir the most because of her Mega Stone."

Sarah nods eagerly as she plops back down in her seat.

"Okay thank you sir!"

"Of course," he smiles.

Then it was back to throwing a dart at a board of hands.

"How about… You?" Brendan points out a kid with short, wavy brown hair in some comfortable looking shorts near the back of the class.

"How come you wear that stupid hat?" The boy asks with a slight sneer.

Half the class erupts in laughter, but Roxanne stares daggers at the boy with a rather angry stomp of her foot. Even Brendan, who chucked lightly at the comment, was silenced at her outburst.

"Joey!" She cries, leading the boy to slump down in his seat. "Please be kind to our guest! He took a lot of his personal time off to be here today."

"Hey, hey. It's okay Roxanne." Brendan tries to appease the teacher by holding a hand out toward her. "Trust me, he's not the first person to ask me about that. Sidney is way ruder about it and he's a member of the Elite Four."

Some more laughter erupts as Brendan re-centers and looks out at the class again.

"Would you believe me if I said this was all the rage in Johto where I grew up?"

* * *

The next few hours passed relatively easily. After they finished the Q&A, Brendan went over the inner workings of the Pokémon League.

He talked about the system of eight Gym Leaders with badges to pass out for testing different battlefield skills (taking a brief aside to discuss the importance of keeping each badge polished and shiny, as he'd learned from a friend in Sinnoh). He talked about the residents of Ever Grande City who waited behind a cavern full of puzzles to test a trainer's skills using Hidden Machines with permissions granted by earning said badges. He talked about both the merits and the downsides of creating teams based on a single typing versus having a diverse team for any occasion.

And before anyone knew it, the 10 a.m. bell rang out from the top of the Devon Corporation building.

"Alright class, that's the bell for break." Roxanne cuts off a topic that luckily sounded like it was on its last legs when she walks back up to the front. "After this we'll be getting back into our regularly scheduled program."

A collective, audible sound of disappointment fills the room. But Roxanne silences it with another quick stomp of her foot.

"Please do not leave our guest with such a negative impression," she says. "Say thank you to Brendan before you leave, please."

"Thank you mister Champion!"

The cheerier collective call ends with a serious of giggles and loud chatter as students all over the room stand up and file outside to enjoy their break.

Once the schoolhouse is empty of everyone but Brendan and Roxanne, the instructor sighs and turns to her guest speaker with a smile.

"Honestly, thank you so much for coming in this morning Brendan." She reaches out to shake his right hand, clasping the back of it with her left hand too. "You don't know how much I needed this break."

"Yeah, no worries!"

Brendan's smile grows into a toothy smirk as he struggles to keep up with her eager shake. His other hand once again starts to rub the back of his neck.

"You definitely make this teaching stuff look way easier than I thought it would be. And I probably had an easier time keeping their attention!"

"I suppose it's not the easiest job, but I wouldn't trade it for the world!" Roxanne laughs as she pulls her hands back and fixes a few stray brown hairs poking out of the two ringed buns styled just above her ears.

"Anything at all?"

"Nothing I can think of, anyway." Once her hair is in order, she rests both hands on her hips and stands with her chest puffed out. "Devon offered me a position researching fossil restoration science when I graduated a while back, on account of my test scores. But I didn't want to be so constrained."

Brendan knew that she was earnestly casual about the comment on her grades, even if it sounded like a not-so-humble brag. It was well known across the Region that she graduated top of her class — and top of most other classes before her, for that matter.

It was kind of Roxanne's bread and butter.

The way her work attire put a modern, professional spin on a school uniform look didn't let anyone forget it.

"Being a Gym Leader and schoolteacher kind of offers me the best of anything I could ever want. I get to keep learning from lots of amazing battles; then I get to pass that knowledge on to the next generation!"

"You know, I totally understand what you mean!" Brendan laughs as he adjusts his backpack up his shoulder again. "I'm not all that great a teacher, but I love learning as much as I can from any battle that comes my way."

"I imagine you get far more interesting challengers than I do," she replies.

There's a brief pause, as Roxanne seems to glance down at her figure before she brushes off the front of her skirt. Then she looks back up at him.

"But I think you're being hard on yourself. You're a great teacher!"

"Oh?" He raises an eyebrow curiously. "What makes you say that?"

"I'm not sure I've learned more recently than I did that first time you challenged my Gym, Brendan." She smiles warmly while slowly bopping her hips from side-to-side, arms folded behind her waist. "You came in with a rare Grass-type that could have destroyed me, but decided to grind down my Nosepass with a little baby Ralts instead."

He snorts and rolls his eyes.

"What can I say? She still needed the extra training."

"That's what I'm saying!" With a wider grin, Roxanne reaches out and rests her somewhat calloused fingers and palm against the bare skin above his right elbow.

He glances down curiously and catches a brief look at her red-painted fingernails.

The color matched her tie and leggings.

"Sometimes it's not always the best idea to go into battle guns blazing," she says. "You might want to prepare weaker partners for future conflicts if you can afford it."

As she notices his eyes gazing down, she quickly pulls her hand away and presses it to her chest; fingers closed into a fist.

"That's a lesson I enjoy passing along to my students."

"Well that's awesome," he remarks with a laugh while rubbing the skin just under his nose with his right index finger. "I'm glad to hear it meant that much!"

"Yeah," she mutters with a soft giggle that trails into silence.

Then the two are immersed in that silence for a good stretch of time. Roxanne shuffles her feet slightly while looking all about the room, her arms crossed over her chest. Brendan keeps a serious, focused gaze and a smile shining right on her. However, the longer the silence lingers, the more that smile fades and he begins clearing his throat.

Was there anything else? Or could he just go and—

"Are you doing anything on Sunday?"

Roxanne's question shatters his internal monologue and leaves the boy staring blankly as his thoughts catch up.

"Wha?" He begins before shaking off the confusion and humming curiously.

"Maybe?" He shrugs, resting his hands on his hips. "What are you thinking?"

She brushes off the awkwardness she perceived on his end with a half-hearted laugh as she looks back up at him. Her right hand comes up so she can start twirling the corresponding ponytail that hung rigidly off the back of her head with a few fingers.

"I just… Figure you have a billion stories from Champion-level battles," she says with a somewhat shaky voice. It passes once she clears her throat. "Was hoping I could pick your brain. To uh… Make some future lesson plans?"

The meandering speech and filler sounds were very unlike the Gym Leader, but Brendan didn't seem to notice.

He just grins at the offer.

"That sounds like it'd be fun!" As he nods, Roxanne's demeanor relaxes with a sigh. "Why Sunday though? Are you busy later today?"

She yelps lightly and nods with an air of immediate dismissal.

"I just—!" The squeaky tone is immediate cut off by her closing her eyes and mentally chastising herself. "I… Have some papers I need to grade this weekend. So I'll need a little more time to get ready."

"Oh," he responds with a somewhat naïve indifference. "Yeah, totally makes sense!"

Roxanne smiles. It seemed her confidence was coming back the longer she got away without any kind of probing questions.

"How about we go to Mauville," she asks. "I've heard a new Lumiose Galette place opened up in the food court. Always wanted to try that."

"Sounds good to me!"

Brendan nods and casually saunters off toward the door with his head still turned toward her.

"Since you've got all that grading to do, just let me know when you want to get together! You've got my PokéNav number, yeah?"

"Yep!" She chirps, pulling out her dual-screened, rectangular orange device. "Talk to you soon Brendan!"

"Good luck with the rest of the day," he replies with a single raised hand.

As soon as Brendan exits the room and Roxanne hears the mob of students accost him once again, she leans hard against the wall like it was the only thing keeping her from falling down. With a warm sigh, she clutches her PokéNav tight to her chest.

* * *

"Soooooo? How'd it go with all those snot-nosed brats?"

After Brendan left the Trainers' School, everyone expected him to have important Champion duties to attend to.

And he did!

… If by important Champion duties, you mean shirking those Champion duties in favor of his weekly scheduled goof-off time with his best friend May back in Littleroot Town. It was a luxury he was afforded by the fact that Steven Stone was eager to keep a regular sitting position as Pokémon League Champion at the top floor of Ever Grande City, and Brendan was more than happy to take advantage of it.

He may be one of the most powerful trainers in the Region — if not the world at large, but Steven recognized that he was still a young guy. And young people deserve the time to goof off and live their lives with gusto.

For Brendan, that typically meant hours of junk food and bad T.V. up in the second-story bedroom of the Birch residence.

The young Champion found the sporty girl lying back on her bed when he enters her room just up the stairs. She was tossing her two-foot-tall electrical mouse up-and-down in the air like a child before he arrived, and hugs the Raichu to her chest as she sits up cross-legged to greet him with the irreverent comment.

Her Raichu was laughing as it snuggles its yellow cheek pouches and curly brown ears into her, its thunderbolt-tipped tail waving over the sheets. Each sound the Pokémon emitted sounded a little like a whirring modem.

"Honestly they weren't so bad," Brendan says optimistically as he tosses his bag by the stairs before jogging over and plopping down next to his friend.

He greets the Raichu by scratching it behind the ear, which gets the Pokémon's tail waggling faster.

May smiles at the gesture, but soon calls the mouse back into its Pokéball in a wave of red, digital energy by tapping the device against the top of its head.

"I only got one question about my hat, which I would consider a win."

"What?!" May scoffs in disbelief as she scrambles to her knees and pulls the white hat off his head.

"Hey!"

She holds it out in her right hand like a rotting lunch bag and points to it with the other.

"But it's so stupid! How could they only have one comment?!"

He snatches the hat back and smoothes it out before letting the accessory cover his scruffy brown hair again. May can't help but grin maliciously at his dismay.

"Ha, ha. Very funny May." He huffs while kicking his legs off the edge of the bed, hands holding the blanket at his sides. "Maybe these kids have just been raised to be more polite than you were."

May shrugs and scratches at her sun-bleached brown hair, which disturbs the pristine red-and-white bow holding together the fluffy ponytails that framed her face.

"To be fair… I don't doubt it." She snorts, looking at the distant staircase. "Just don't tell Mom."

"Secret's safe with me."

She agrees to the end of their exchange with a nod before flopping onto her back again, letting her spaghetti-strap red top and thigh-length grey athletic shorts — inexplicably covered with a pair of white denim shorts less than half the size — get all wrinkled and disjointed as she squirms with a light groan.

"It took you long enough to get over here, by the way. I'm starting to think this whole Champion business is going to your head and ruining our friendship!"

Brendan snorts and rolls his eyes. He pulls his PokéNav out of his pocket and starts idly tapping away.

"You're so full of it, Birch."

"Eugh…" She playfully shoves at his side, though it wasn't much of a shove considering she insisted on laying down the whole time. "May is fine, Brendan. Don't make me sound too much like my Dad here."

"If you say so," he snickers at her audible discomfort. "Just saying, your whole 'rising Contest Star' schtick makes you sound pretty hotheaded too."

"Whatever!"

She awkwardly snatches a pillow from above her head, ruining the nicely made bed in the process. He can hear her grumble into the pillow after it goes over her face.

"Sorry I like being famous and popular sometimes," she says with muffled words.

"Mmmmmmmhm."

He smiles at her without looking, but that smile fades as he growls at his device.

May sits up again, but continues to hold the pillow against her face so her words would be muffled as she talks to him.

"What's your problem?"

"Have you heard anything about that new Kalosian bakery place in Mauville?" He looks toward her and holds up his PokéNav's Internet search function for her to see. "I can't find anything serious about it online."

The pillow falls over May's legs, exposing her curiously squinting gaze and now-disheveled hair.

"Not really…" She says with a slow, cautious tone. "Why do you ask?"

"I'm meeting Roxanne there on Sunday to help her out with s'more school stuff, so I wanted to get a clue on what I'm getting myself into."

He shrugs and brings his device back to look down and type away at it again.

The room is silent of everything but his fingers tapping as May spends a stunned moment staring at him, mouth agape.

"I'm sorry, what?"

"Yeah. She's working on some lesson plans or something, needs a bit of my expertise as a _Champion_."

Brendan puts some extra emphasis on the last word to flaunt it in her face and chuckles.

Again, May just stares silently for a long moment. Her left eye lightly twitches.

Then she reaches out and roughly grabs his shoulder. The boy lets out a light 'ow' while looking over at her.

"What the hell May?"

"Let me get this straight, Brendan." She clears her throat and squeezes his shoulder a little harder. Her other hand clutches her crossed left leg just as hard. "Gym Leader Roxanne invited you to go get food with her at the mall. On an off-day."

"Yeah?"

He wasn't getting it. May was screaming internally; how wasn't he getting it?

"Brendan!"

"What?!"

She shoves him much more seriously this time before throwing her arms out for a dramatic gesture.

"You really do need to get a clue!" She yells, eyes somewhat crazed. "She asked you out on a date, dude!"

"What?" Brendan stares at her blankly, blinking a few times. "You're crazy."

May slaps both hands to her face and screams into them.

"How did an idiot like you become the freakin' Pokémon League Champion?!"

He stares at her for a long time. Words don't seem to come, but the way his mouth creaks open and closed like a puppet suggests he wanted them to.

Eventually May throws her hands back down to her thighs so their similarly grey-blue eyes could meet. She keeps her gaze focused to emphasize how serious she was, even though his start to dart around more frequently as his breathing picks up.

"H-Hang on," he starts with a stutter, waving both hands in the air to dissuade her. "It definitely wasn't that… Was it?"

"I don't know Brendan, was it?" She yells at him before scrambling off the bed so she can stand at the foot of it and stare him down with hands on her hips.

"Did the exchange go anything like this?"

May clears her throat with closed eyes before taking a big step backward.

Once she opens her eyes again, he could tell she was in full acting mode. Her facial features had softened to intentionally look more sweet and feminine, matching her looser body posture. All of her fingers fold together as she holds the woven digits under her chin.

"My-oh-my Mister Champion," she leans into a southern belle imitation. "You're so awfully humble and nice, coming to help little ol' me with all these rambunctious kiddos."

Brendan was in disbelief as he watched her put on this show. It didn't sound anything like Roxanne…

But he was admittedly pretty entertained.

May turns about 45 degrees to the right, tenses up her body and shifts her hands to her hips. She bends her elbows out wide and puffs out her chest.

"It was no trouble at all, Miss." Now her voice was deep and gruff, masculine to parody levels. "Anything for you. I'm strong and cool, aren't I?"

Brendan rolls his eyes.

May doesn't stop however. She turns 45 degrees to the left again and returns to her girly bit with a shrill giggle, a leg kicked back and a hand twirling at her ponytail.

That particular motion makes Brendan's eyes widen and his cheeks run red.

As silly as this was, now he was seeing the signs he missed earlier.

"Well I'd so very much love to… Uh… Pick your brain, Cham-peen." She laughs again and bites her thumb. "Wanna get some food with me big guy~?"

Brendan lets out an annoyed call before jumping to his feet.

"Alright! Alright, I get it!" He skips over and grabs both May's shoulders, shaking her aggressively.

She just kind of laughs the whole time.

"May we're totally going on a date! What do I do?!"

"You go on the damn date, idiot!" Her words can barely break through the heavy laughter as she grabs his hips to stop him from shaking her.

"I've never been on a date! I couldn't even tell that's what was happening back there!"

"Clearly…" She mumbles, rolling her eyes with a grin.

"Stop enjoying this!" He whirls around and starts pacing around the room, hands gripping his hair. "I'm freaking out now and it's all your fault!"

May scoffs and holds a hand to her heart, looking offended.

"My fault? Dude, you're the one that couldn't tell teacher had the hots for you!"

"Gah, no don't put it like that."

It was Brendan's turn to hide his face in his hands and scream into them while pacing.

May just kind of watches with reverie while heading back over to sit on her bed.

"I'm so fucked May, what do I do?"

"Just relax," she responds with a calmer tone before laying back and staring at the ceiling. "You've taken on the world and beat them all back with a gecko, I think you can handle a one-on-one with a girl."

"But… But…" He stops and turns to stare at her, exacerbated as he throws his arms out toward her repeatedly. "What if it doesn't go well?"

"What if it does go well?" She retorts.

"What if she wants to like...Kiss or whatever?"

"Then you grow some Voltorbs and kiss her! You aren't a couple of innocent preschoolers, it happens."

"Okay, but what if she wants to go further and… You know."

May squirms and whines while covering her face.

"Ew, Brendan!" She throws her hands down again and glares at him. "First off, not a thing I want to think about you doing. Ever."

He rolls his eyes.

"Second, definitely don't do that on the first date? Like have some fucking standards, dude."

"I don't know what standards are for this May, I'm a freakin' loser!"

She jumps to her feet and prods a finger against his sternum.

"You're a Champion of the Hoenn Pokémon League. You've battled an ancient water god that tried to drown the planet in rain. You've been to space and battled a weird living space virus." The girl shakes her head sternly. "I think all that qualifies you to be the exact opposite of a loser."

The sentiment is agreeable enough, but leaves Brendan staring down at his feet. He had no idea how to respond, despite how correct she was.

"But… How does girl?" He mutters.

May groans and turns around, ruffling her hands in her hair.

"Look, I'll help coach you or whatever. Alright?"

He nods even though she can't see it while turned away.

She knew he would agree, though.

"Maybe talk to your Gardevoir too. She reads your emotions or whatever, right?"

He nods again.

"Good! Just try not to like… Get too excited while you talk to her."

"Ew, May." He slaps a hand to his forehead and shakes the other one out to dissuade her. "I don't even want to think about that. Don't put it in my head."

She stares at him with a half-lidded glare that soon becomes something more malicious as she smirks.

"Saving it all for your wedding night, lover boy?"

Brendan crosses his arms and looks away with a huff. As soon as his cheeks flare red, May knew she was going to have a good time.

"Let's just get this over with, May."

* * *

_**Hello there! Thanks for taking the time to read this one-off I've had nagging at the back of my head for a while. **__**I know it's on the longer side, so I really appreciate it! **_

_**The anticipation for Sword and Shield had me dying to write a Pokémon-themed story, and this seemed like as good a time as any to put it up. Might honestly write some content for the new generation once I'm all the way through it, we'll have to see how they stick the landing with my girl Marnie in particular.**_

_**But that's neither here nor there.**_

_**The best friends hanging out bits between Brendan and May take some inspiration from the story "Critical Hit" by Alphinia [ID: 13383963]. May's casual cussing dialogue in particular also draws a bit from Carly Chaikin's performance as Darlene Alderson from the USA T.V. show "Mr. Robot." Show them both some love if you liked this!**_

_**If you were a fan of this or any of my other stories, I'm also in the business of taking commissions for some creative fan fictions. Go ahead and hit up the info in my profile or just shoot me a private message if you're interested.**_

_**Otherwise, I hope you have a great day!**_

* * *

**Featured Image courtesy of James Petts via Wikimedia Commons**


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